Send Roaches on Run: 10 Reason Why Roaches are the Worst

Do you really even need a reason to get rid of roaches? Few bugs are as universally reviled as the cockroach. Just in case you’re ever tempted to let one get past you, here are 10 reasons why roaches are just the worst.

A newly hatched cockroach will be fully mature in just about 36 days. That means in just over a month, it can and probably will be breeding the next generation.

Roaches can live without food for up to a month. They can just hang out waiting for you to drop a few chips for an entire lunar cycle.

They’re scary-fast. A cockroach can run up to 3 miles an hour and that’s from the time they’re a disgusting day-old baby and only the size of a dust speck.

That “myth” about a roach being able to live for a week with no head? It’s true. They breathe through vents in their body and can go a month with no food. They only need their heads to hold their mouths for drinking water and can live about a week without even that.

Trying to flush away a roach? Keep trying! They can hold their breath for up to 40 minutes and survive being completely submerged for at least 30 minutes.

They eat nearly anything. If it’s not food, they’ll still eat it. Book bindings, wallpaper paste, drywall, cardboard – it’s all dinner. There is even documentation of roaches feeding on the toenails and hair of sleeping children. (We’ll give you a minute to get over that one.)

They poop as they walk and they will walk everywhere – walls, counters, cabinets, furniture, bedding, food storage containers – they don’t care.

They’re nocturnal so they come out while you’re sleeping and can’t smash them with your shoes.

Cockroaches can get into your house through a crack that’s only 1.5 millimeters (or 1/16 of an inch) wide. You know that tiniest increment on an average ruler? It’s the one you never use because it’s too small. That’s 1/16 inch. And it’s all they need to sneak inside your house.

Roaches spread some of the nastiest diseases and bacteria like salmonella and their shed skins and waste (see the extra-gross #7) do serious harm to allergy and asthma sufferers. They carry up to 33 different kinds of bacteria, 6 types of parasitic worms, and 7 known pathogens.

BONUS! Cockroaches can withstand 15 times the dose of radiation that is lethal to humans.

If this list doesn’t have you calling the nearest Worcester, Massachusetts company, then nothing will!